Dietary Polyphenols and Carbohydrate Metabolism

“Polyphenols, including flavonoids, phenolic acids, proanthocyanidins and resveratrol, are a large and heterogeneous group of phytochemicals in plant-based foods, such as tea, coffee, wine, cocoa, cereal grains, soy, fruits and berries. Growing evidence indicates that various dietary polyphenols may influence carbohydrate metabolism at many levels.”

—Inhibition of carbohydrate digestion and glucose absorption in the intestine.

—Stimulation of insulin secretion from the pancreas.

—Suppression of glucose release from the liver.

—Improvement in peripheral tissue (such as muscle) glucose uptake.

—Modulation of hepatic glucose output.

This article is a fascinating explanation for the underlying biochemistry of how compounds in these foods specifically impact carbohydrate metabolism, and if you’re interested in the underlying mechanisms I highly encourage you to read the entire article.

Regarding cinnamon, one of my favorite spices:

“Ingestion of cinnamon (6 g) with rice pudding significantly lowered blood glucose response in the postprandial phase (15, 30 and 45 min) in 14 healthy subjects [50,51]. However, in another study of the same group [51], cinnamon (3 g) reduced postprandial serum insulin and increased GLP-1 concentrations without significantly affecting blood glucose response. Cinnamon has high content of proanthocyanidins.”

And chocolate:

“interesting results have been produced in human trials by dark chocolate consumption. Dark chocolate (100 g dark chocolate bar containing approximately 500 mg of polyphenols for 15 days) improved insulin sensitivity along with reducing blood pressure in healthy subjects [166] and similar results were reported with the same treatment on hypertensive subjects [167].”